3 Cars and a Trailer

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If you had to choose between a day at the track and  day at the drag strip, I’m assuming most of you would pick the former. Just as well then, that the choice was made for us during what was meant to be a weekend of motorsport.

We had planned to take 2 cars to Crail Raceway… Scotland’s ‘premier’ drag strip (read: only drag strip). Well, at least it’s the only official drag strip, barring such oddities as the Barmac Mile and other spots known only to locals of hooning intent. Since the Astra was promoted to all round ‘track weapon’ it now meant that taking two cars to such an event automatically involved  in to 3 cars and a trailer.

“What could possibly go wrong…”

The Rig is the affectionate term for an Omega pulling an enormous car trailer with an Astra on top. This view bearing down on you in your rear view mirror is enough to make you pull swiftly aside on the fast lane of the A90 as much out of confusion as horror. The mighty V6 grunt of the Omega does a good enough job of lugging that enormous weight around even if it doesn’t do such a good job of stopping it. A swift servicing of the trailers brakes is likely in order though they’re probably a good deal more freed off than they were before they were thrashed around Fife’s back roads over a 2 day road trip.

An earlier chat with a friend suggested that there was a track day with open pit lane and strict rules occurring at Knockhill, Scotland’s ‘premier’ race track, that very weekend (read: only race track). Well, at least it’s the only official race track…

A weekend of motorsport was born.

A suitably located Premier Inn was sought in the upstanding Scottish town of Glenrothes, which happily also provided a car park big enough to accept the illustrious HMS Vauxhall. Well, the pub next door did anyway, and thanks to our last minute preparations and with no foresight whatsoever we arrived late enough to find the pub shut and the car park empty.

Knockhill was a brand new day with near perfect track day conditions. The sun was shining, the track was recently resurfaced and though not fully worn in, the slippery conditions of earlier in the year had given way to smooth trouble free tarmac. It was a dry day, the likes of which Scotland hadn’t seen for approximately 4 months. Truly perfect conditions during which to make the most of a 4 hour open pit session. What could possibly go wrong.

The Astra had been taken off the road last year to get around that pesky annual MOT requirement and also because the modifications in place were already making it an unruly daily driver. The carbon clutch purchased a number of years ago had long since deceased after only a year, mainly thanks to the stress of the launch required to successfully clear the Haudagain roundabout. This meant that the fateful morning on which it had been delivered, whereby I had been summoned by a UPS delivery man flapping a £140 import duty charge in my face on my doorstep, had totally been worth it… Ah yes, sarcasm. I’d been stood in my pyjamas looking bewildered as the full enormity of why my husband hadn’t wanted to disclose the full amount spent on his ‘overnight parts from the US’ became clear. The replacement Spax Viggen clutch was holding up nicely however and we’d since forgiven the LSD for it’s grunting and grinding in super market car parks when it had proven its worth many times over around the Nurburgring. That is, we had forgiven it… until today.

The 5th run around what is an undeniably short track, the Astra started to judder hideously under power. It soon became apparent that all was not well, though the source was not immediately identifiable. We limped forlornly back to the paddock, grateful that the car could, for now at least, still move under it’s own steam.

 Upon checking the time, we had used approximately 1hr15 minutes of a 4 hour track session and we were now stood in front of a newly deceased Vauxhall Astra. It was clear by this point that the problem was too big to effect a miraculous resuscitation here in the paddock and very little remained to be done but get it back on the trailer.

It was at this point, whilst lamenting over the downfall of the most exciting 1/3 of the HMS Vauxhall that we suddenly became aware of the 3rd car in this sorry saga. Our heads turned in slow unison towards the unsuspecting Mini Cooper S parked alongside. Any queries around scrutineering were quashed when the team simply replied ‘just move the blue sticker’ upon enquiring about a last minute, breakdown induced vehicle swap for the day. We were back in the game and with 2hr30 left of the session, there was plenty of time to make up.

The mini is stock. Stock brakes, stock power, stock suspension. It was a revelation. The only change from factory was a set of 15″ Rota slipstreams which are naturally a very light wheel, but made even more so by the loss of 2″ of diameter from the factory 17″ bullet wheels which come with the car. The tyres were an old set of toyo proxes from back in the day when Eddie was running his 1.4 litre Vauxhall Corsa. Despite the propensity for rubber to go off, a quick look over these suggested that they’d ‘probably last the day’ which was as far in to the future as we were willing to look at this stage. With the shattered diff in the Astra, Crail was now much less important than eeking a few more glorious hours out of Knockhill in a stock Cooper S.

Eddie took her out first and almost went off the track at the first corner. Wait… what!? I thought you said it was decent? The turn in on the Mini was so much more aggressive than on the Astra that he turned too soon, grass beckoned. A quick recalibration from the driver meant that we were soon on our way with a greater appreciation for the Mini’s go-kart reputation. From that corner forward, much fun was had. The 300+bhp of the Astra is hard to handle on a short track. The benefit of the 170bhp Mini was that you could rev the tit’s off it and never be going too fast. The car was tight and chuckable, perfect for my code zero skill level. The tyres and brakes were the limiting factor, both holding out for 4 laps max. A new hobby was birthed that weekend with me resolving to upgrade the brake fluid and change the rear pads as a start, given that the front’s had only recently been done for the MOT. She also came with with pair of R56 17″ Crown alloys which are due to be sold to make way for something sporty and lightweight with a set of R888’s or something similar.

In short – can’t wait to get it back out on the track and next time we’ll be booking on two cars instead of one… though given the state of the diff on the Astra and the fact that he can’t even make eye contact with it right now it’ll be more likely to be the VX220 joining me next time.

The Fleet: Mini R52 Cooper S

I think the entire planet is in agreement that the BMW/Mini collaboration was an enormous success when designing and producing the 2nd generation Mini. The original Mini was produced from 1959 – 2000 with the 2nd generation making its entrance to the market in early 2001.

The original Mini was, and continues to be, a 60s icon and even if you’re not a Mini fan, sighting an original Mini is sure to bring a smile to your face. BMW obviously considered this ‘challenge accepted’ when they brought out the R50-R53 models with a distinctly 60s feel. Yes it was bigger, yes it was heavier, yes it was safer, but it held all of that British retro charm that seemed so important to the Mini brand.

This particular Mini Adventure started with an R52 (code for the soft top) Mini Cooper in Cool Blue making 115 hp from an agricultural 1.6 litre petrol engine. I loved the colour, I loved the convertible, I loved the looks. I loved everything about it except the speed. It was time to look at the Cooper S.

After much umming and ahhing, a tidy Mini Cooper S convertible was found on 42,000 miles in Cleveland. Ignoring the occasional lumpy idle, the steering wheel lurching aggressively to the right under acceleration and the hurricane-like wind noise coming from the roof above 50mph, we handed over the cash and drove on our way south having transferred all of our possessions from the diesel Astra we had travelled down in.

The intercooler sits on top of the engine on supercharged models giving the need for the immediately recognisable bonnet scoop of all Cooper S models. With later turbo charged models the intercooler sits lower at the front so the bonnet scoop remains only for looks. Another reason to prefer the R53.

The first generation of the modern Mini bolted a supercharger to their 1.6 petrol engine to create the Cooper S. This was the first and last generation to supercharge the engine as after this BMW decided to turbocharge later models with varying degrees of success and reliability.

There are both benefits and pitfalls to superchargers; the former being the predictability of the power available it having a N/A style continuous delivery without the wave of torque delivered by a turbocharger and a relatively small power band as a result. The pitfalls are mainly the perceived lack of ‘oomph’ compared to a turbocharger and that it is a less efficient method of forced induction as it drains more power from the engine to drive the belt than the more economical method of using waste exhaust gases to drive a turbine and compressor as with a turbocharger. However, both of these aside, you’re hard pushed to beat the shear joy of supercharger whine as you give it the beans.

The Cooper S is as exciting around town as it is on an A road. Go-kart-like handling is complemented by over-fuelling on overrun creating a symphony of burbles, pops and bangs almost on command. This is the kind of thing you need a re-map and an exhaust system to achieve, along with a healthy dose of ‘fingers crossed’.

There are many that believe that the R50-R53 Mini’s are well on their way to becoming a modern classic. I have the opportunity to keep this Cooper S Convertible mainly off the road (apart from the odd weekend run in the sun) at 56,000 miles on the clock for a 13 year old car. Cooper S’s peaked on the road at 34,000 between 2007 and 2009 though it’s hard to pin down how many Cooper S Convertibles were sold in the UK. Cabrio’s have a tendency to retain their value more than their hardtop counterparts, likely due to reduced supply thanks to the lunatics who originally went out and spent more £££’s on something with a shorter shelf life.

 

This one has developed a bad leak on the passenger side turning the passenger footwell in to an aquarium depending on the wind direction and incline on which it is parked should the heavens open overnight.

The lumpy idle remains an intermittent niggle and with few other symptoms, there is no way of pinning this down until it gets worse.

The violent apparent torque steer turned out to be a severely worn lower suspension arm bush which have now been replaced by poly bushes, and when I say severely worn, I mean sheared…

A garage application is in with Aberdeen City Council to see if I can secure some dry storage for this beauty to try and keep her tip-top for years to come. Nothing puts a smile on my face like this British/German love child. The Mini is dead. Long live the Mini.